Key insights into today's digital news consumption from latest RISJ report

The Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ) published its annual Digital News Report today (June 15), looking at trends in digital news consumptions across platforms and devices and analysing data from 50,000 people surveyed across 26 countries.

At the launch event hosted in London this morning, David Pemsel, chief executive officer of the Guardian Media Group; John McAndrew, director of content at Sky News; Katie-Vanneck-Smith, chief customer officer and global managing director for Dow Jones International; and Stephen Hull, editor-in-chief of Huffington Post UK, discussed the report's main findings.

Here is a snapshot of the results and the conversation from Twitter. You can catch up on the discussion using #DNP2016 or watch it on Periscope:

• Twenty-eight per cent of 18-24 year-olds surveyed said social media is their main source of news, surpassing television for the first time, which stood at 24 per cent.

• Facebook leads the way in the top most used social platforms for news, with 44 per cent, followed by YouTube (19 per cent), Twitter (10 per cent) and WhatsApp (8 per cent).

Top social platforms used for news: FB, YT, Twitter, WhatsApp. Snapchat ranks low #DNP2016 pic.twitter.com/lJreXJmtsu

— Mădălina Ciobanu (@madalinacrc) June 15, 2016

• Seventy-eight per cent of people said in the study they still "mostly rely on text" as opposed to video for news, citing speed and convenience as a main reason (41 per cent), followed by the presence of pre-roll ads (35 per cent).

• People tend to use traditional news outlets as primary sources, and digital-only outlets as additional sources or 'guilty pleasures'. In the UK, 70 per cent of those surveyed said their got their news mainly from BBC News, while only 13 per cent of respondents cited The Huffington Post and BuzzFeed as their main sources.

.@johnlucius says Facebook has meant a re-think of their editorial process - @SkyNews is a digital producer before a TV channel #DNP2016

— Edelman UK (@EdelmanUK) June 15, 2016

.@VanneckKatie - @DowJones is a subscription business, we don't see the same trends as #DNP2016 - payment for news is in growth for us

— Edelman UK (@EdelmanUK) June 15, 2016

.@VanneckKatie says Dow Jones puts technology news and content into Instant Articles: "converts best for us into subscriptions" #DNP2016

— Mădălina Ciobanu (@madalinacrc) June 15, 2016

.@VanneckKatie just described a business plan for social distribution broken down by perceived income benefit per platform #DNP2016

— Corinne Podger: @corinnepodger (Threads), LinkedIn (@corinne_podger) June 15, 2016

Tweet could not be found or could not be loaded.

.@VanneckKatie tells #DNP2016 subscrip'n doesn't undermine holding authority to account. But membership is necessary to access that content.

— Corinne Podger: @corinnepodger (Threads), LinkedIn (@corinne_podger) June 15, 2016

• News is increasingly found through aggregators and social networks, which means news brands get noticed "less than half the time in the UK and Canada", the study highlighted, and only "a quarter of a time" in Japan and South Korea.

: "When people come to you through social, who do they actually have a relationship with, the platform or you?" #DNP2016

— Mădălina Ciobanu (@madalinacrc) June 15, 2016

• Survey respondents were interested the concept of personalised stories, but expressed some concern around algorithm-curated news, that might result in missing out on key information or different viewpoints.

• Thirty-six per cent said they would be happy for their news to be selected automatically based on their previous consumption habits, 30 per cent were happy to rely on editorial judgement and only 22 per cent said they would rely on articles served automatically based on social recommendations.

Algorithms don't get to choose the stories&send the teams out, but they definitely impact news meetings, says @johnlucius #DNP2016

— Reuters Institute (@risj_oxford) June 15, 2016

When talking algorithms & journalists, think of how historically tools don't replace people-people w/tools replace people w/o tools #DNP2016

— Rasmus Kleis Nielsen (@rasmus_kleis) June 15, 2016

Final #DNP2016 comments: David Pemsel says atomisation of content 'permanent'. #VR and other new tech difficult to predict longevity 1/2

— Corinne Podger: @corinnepodger (Threads), LinkedIn (@corinne_podger) June 15, 2016

Here to stay: mobile news consumption. What we haven't seen: frictionless methods that allow people to pay for news -@VanneckKatie #DNP2016

— Mădălina Ciobanu (@madalinacrc) June 15, 2016

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